Sarx

NE OF MY Favourite “East vrs WEst” things – since my Chrismatoin – has been the whole issue of American Individualism. Over and over again the Fathers and Mothers of the Church emphasise the collective sense of HUmanity. Christ did not come to save me or you or Pope Benedict XVI so much as Christ [...]

HE FOLLOWING Paragraph is copied from Is Reconstructionist Judaism For You?, written by the Jewish Reconstructionist Federation. It’s the second in the discussion. Christians coming from traditions using liturgical worship will, perhaps, find this paragraph making sense. I think this will be true for very conservative as well as very liberal communities: While deeply connected [...]

EADING the current issue of Geez is hard because – among other things – it points out how many times we assume privilege and power in our equations for “fixing” the poor. Take a look at this bit on Changing the story of change, mindful that you’re reading about a Christian Organisation. The first mark [...]

NE OF MY Favourite lines is from St Maria of Paris. To paraphrase, she said God one ask her about her ritual or her prayers. God will, rather, ask her if she fed the poor he sent her way. This is rightfully read as a claim that those who show the trappings of religiosity but [...]

VER AT Religion-Dispatches, Pastor Candace Chellew-Hodge asks Does the President Need Churching? Seems the man still isn’t going to church on Sunday. Like the vast majority of Americans, I might add. She has this great paragraph in the middle… “Personally, I don’t care if President Obama goes to church. As a pastor I know first-hand [...]

‘ALL (Clergy or not) take a look at this post from TribalChurch. Although she writes in a Presbyterian community, I think it’s a valid question for us using the traditional model of the three-fold ministerial hierarchy of Deacon, Presbyter, Bishop (in the Indy, Eastern, Roman, Anglican or Lutheran etc communities). How do we stop seeing [...]

HE Following Quote from Metropolitan Jonah sets the stage for my thoughts today. It’s from his Pastoral Letter for the Sanctity of Life Sunday and I think it ties all the issues together nicely in a handful of sentences: Most of all, we must restore the family: not just the nuclear family, but the multi-generational [...]

UNDAY’S SERMON Moved me from a quiet meditation (I was sitting with my eyes closed, peaceably listening) to an eye-popping climax The whole basis of our economic life has been made into competition with one another, and rooted in out-consuming each other. Instead of inter-dependence we have all been raised in the myth of self-sufficiency. [...]

ISTENING THIS Morning to the readings at Church, Proper 22: Year A in the Revised Common Lectionary, I was struck to the core by this line from Matthew: [Jesus is speaking] Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of [...]

RINITY is the third of the “Big Three” doctrines without which I can’t make sense of Christianity. It is the third leg of my own personal xmin stool. It is also the third in doctrinal Chronology. After Eucharist (from the very beginning) through an understanding of Jesus as God, came the understanding of God as [...]